Thursday, October 5, 2017

Andy Tyler has been the class daredevil since middle school. Over the years, he’s convinced his best friend, Jake Masterson, to perform some dangerous-looking stunts with him. But the dare they attempt on the night of their college graduation goes sideways. The firecrackers explode too soon and both of them end up with badly burned palms.

But hey, nothing gets the “terrible two-o” down for long, and they recuperate in style at Andy’s family cottage in Cape Cod. As the weeks go by, both Andy and Jake grow frustrated over the inability to use their hands for all sorts of daily activities—including getting off. So Andy begins a new series of dares that don’t just cross the friendship line, they obliterate it.

But what might be mere sexual relief to Andy is serious business to Jake, who only recently got over years of secret pining for his straight best friend. Inevitably, the burns heal, summer ends, and hearts are broken. To fix things, Andy will have to face the greatest dare of all.

“. . . two . . . three . . . four . . .” Andy’s count was infuriatingly slow. The lit firecrackers we held sparked and sizzled. A mix of exhilaration and dread made goose bumps break out all over my body.

We stood next to a swimming pool at a private party in Brooklyn. It was the night of our college graduation, and maybe that made everyone crazier than usual. Andy was definitely in peak crazy zone tonight. He and I stood facing one other, a brown-wrapped firecracker the size and shape of a hotdog lying across each of our four palms. The base of my spine tingled and my heart pumped ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum, like the strokes on a drum on a slave ship in some old movie.

God, I never felt more alive than when Andy and I were performing a stunt!

This particular trick had started with Andy showing up by the pool, holding aloft four candle bombs. “Where’s my man Jake?” he’d called out.

I’d been in position near the pool, pretending to listen to a group conversation. At Andy’s prompt, I stepped forward. “What are you doing, bro?”

He brandished the firecrackers. “You and me, Jakey. We light these puppies and hold on to them for the count of ten. You in?”

The crowd reaction washed over us in an electric rush. There were hoots of encouragement from the guys, and some girls lost their shit, especially Andy’s girlfriend, Amber. God, it was great. Andy was a show-off, and I was always willing to get swept along in his wild wake. His eyes stayed locked on me, but I knew he was soaking in every mote of the attention as everyone at the party gathered around the pool to see what would happen.

Andy drew attention naturally. He was so damn good-looking and charismatic with his bleached-blond hair, huge blue eyes, and wide smile. When he wasn’t being all serious, when he was playful and wild and free and reckless like he was tonight, no one could resist him.

Certainly not me. Never me. Though I pretended otherwise.

“It’s too dangerous,” I said with a pfft of dismissal. “You’ve lost your mind.”

“I dare ya, Jake Masterson. I. Dare. You.” He continued to hold out the firecrackers.

“Stop it!” Amber insisted. “Andy, please.”

There were hoots in the crowd. More people came out of the house to watch.

With a dramatic roll of my eyes, and a loud grumble about death wishes and how dangerous it was, I slowly reached out and took two of the firecrackers, acting all reluctant. Andy loved to fuck with people’s heads, and he said I was the best wingman ever. I certainly did my best to help freak people out.

He held up the two brown-wrapped candle bombs he still had left. “Right, then! Ladies

To read this excerpt in its entirety or learn more about the book, visit Riptide Publishing.

Having been, at various times and under different names, a minister’s daughter, a computer programmer, a game designer, an author of paranormal thrillers, a fan-fiction writer, an organic farmer, and a profound sleeper, Eli Easton is happy these days writing love stories.

As an avid reader of such, she is tinkled pink when an author manages to combine literary merit, vast stores of humor, melting hotness, and eye-dabbing sweetness into one story. She promises to strive to achieve most of that most of the time. She currently lives on a farm in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, with her husband, three bulldogs, two cows, a cat, and a potbellied pig. She enjoys reading in all genres and, when she can be pried away from her iPad, hiking and biking.

Eli Easton has published 24 books in m/m romance since 2013. She won the Rainbow Award for Best Contemporary Romance in 2014 (The Mating of Michael) and in 2016 (A Second Harvest). Her Howl at the Moon series of humorous dog shifter romances have become fan favorites and placed in the Rainbow Awards and the Goodreads M/M Group Reader’s Choice awards. She is best known for romances with humor and a lot of heart.

Riptide giveaway... To celebrate the release of Five Dares, one lucky winner will receive a $20 Riptide gift card! Leave a comment with your contact info to enter the contest. Entries close at midnight, Eastern time, on October 7, 2017. Contest is NOT restricted to U.S. entries. Thanks for following the tour, and don’t forget to leave your contact info!

TTC giveaway...every comment is entered into a monthly giftcard giveaway!

Congrats, Eli, and thanks for the excerpt. This sounds great. I love the tension that builds in friends to lovers stories, and the set up for this has so much fun built into it. - Purple Reader,TheWrote [at] aol [dot] com